100% Call Automation in 6 Weeks: How Nabis Went From Reactive to Proactive CX

Scaling CX capacity by reallocating 45% of the team in just 6 weeks. Nabis is the #1 licensed cannabis wholesale platform, supplying dispensaries with the largest portfolio of cannabis brands in the world. Coordinating thousands of orders weekly, they partnered with Applied Labs to automate their most manual workflow: delivery confirmations.

By deploying an AI voice agent, they removed the bottleneck of outbound dialing, allowing them to reallocate talent and elevate their customer experience without adding headcount.

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Highlights

• 0→100% of calls automated in just 6 weeks, eliminating manual dialing entirely.
• 45% of the Confirmations team reallocated to the core CX department, resolving a critical backlog without adding headcount.
• 99% Success Rate, with follow-ups triggered automatically based on call outcomes.

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The Pain: A Resource Bottleneck Stalling Growth

Leadership identified the manual confirmation process as a critical bottleneck. It wasn't just an operational nuisance, it was a barrier to scaling the business.

"I would probably rate [the pain] at an eight or a nine. Without a solution, we either hire additional confirmation staff…or we just accept the fact that we're going to deteriorate in performance.

Francois Casabonne, Director of Customer Experience

• 100% Resource Drain on Low-Value Tasks: Hundreds of daily calls consumed the entire capacity of the Confirmations team. With >50% going unanswered, highly-trained staff were stuck in a low-value loop of leaving voicemails and chasing retailers via email.
• Stalled Growth & CX Backlog: While the Confirmations team was tied up with manual dialing, the core CX team faced its own volume surge. The backlog and pressure were growing.
• Transactional vs. Relational: Because human agents were drowning in volume, they couldn't build relationships. They became "glorified order takers" rushing through calls to meet deadlines, with zero capacity to build personal relationships or handle complex escalations.

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What Nabis Evaluated & Where It Fell Short

Before finding Applied Labs, Nabis attempted to solve this with the #1 Voice AI vendor.

The Shortfall: The competitor platform was too rigid for the non-linear reality of human conversation. Minor edits caused major failures. As Chelsea Murawski (CX Operations Manager) noted, "It was really hard because if one line in the script wasn't working, it was difficult to figure out how to fix it [without] something else later on breaking."

The Friction: Implementation stalled due to lack of expertise. When Nabis reached out for help, they found that "the vendor wasn't much better at troubleshooting than we were."

The Outcome: The system failed to deliver, leaving the team skeptical that AI could handle the nuances of the cannabis industry.

"With the previous vendor, it felt like they were 'nickeling and diming' us for basic features like voice customization. Having a partner with transparent pricing and a dedicated engineering team that actually supports us has been a huge plus."

Brian Rhee, Business Operations Manager

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Why Applied Labs

Nabis chose Applied Labs for its technical capabilities and hands-on partnership that met their unique industry constraints:

• Privacy Guardrails for Financial Data: A critical requirement was ensuring the AI would never disclose financial details to unauthorized personnel. Applied Labs implemented a verification protocol: the AI agent explicitly validates the recipient's authorization before discussing any invoice or payment data, mirroring the security standards of Nabis’ human agents.
• Keyword Understanding: The cannabis industry uses heavy acronyms like "COD" (Cash on Delivery) and has non-standard brand names (Pabst Labs). Applied Labs tuned the agent to understand these terms naturally, ensuring it didn't get confused by industry-specific terminology.
• Background Noise Detection: Retailers are often on the floor in loud dispensaries. The AI was optimized to filter background noise (music, chatter) and maintains a 99% success rate in understanding intent.
• Collaborative Development Partnership: Nabis felt they were building the solution with Applied Labs. The Applied Labs team serves as an extension of Nabis’ operations, answering questions immediately and resolving complex edge cases. This agility expedited setup and testing, which typically takes months. Result: 0 to 100% call automation in just 6 weeks.

"Anytime we have a question or an update we want to make, we get a response immediately. It’s been a relief having a partner that is super reliable whenever we need anything—it feels like an extension of our own team."

Chelsea Murawski, CX Operations Manager

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Results

100% Call Volume Automation Driving Strategic Reallocation By automating all confirmation calls, Nabis redeployed 45% of the Confirmations team to the core CX department. This immediately resolved a critical service backlog, allowing Nabis to scale support without the cost or delay of new hires.

Speed, Quality & Efficiency:

• Speed: Full deployment was achieved in just 6 weeks.
• Quality: 99% success rate, with follow-ups automated based on call outcomes.
• Efficiency: A high-friction bottleneck became a seamless workflow, eliminating the daily burden of manual calls.

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Changing the Narrative of AI

Initially, AI was met with skepticism and fear that automation might signal job loss. This deployment flipped that script. It rescued the team from an operational grind, transforming their role from repetitive dialing to strategic relationship management.

"We don't just have a glorified order-taking team anymore. Now, we can actually focus on the personal relationship with the retailer...It allows us to focus on the human element."

Francois Casabonne, Director of Customer Experience

This shifted the Nabis’ perspective on automation: AI is no longer seen as a substitute for talent, but as a catalyst for it. The team has moved past repetitive, low-value tasks to focus entirely on the human-centric problem solving that drives customer loyalty.

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Organizational Impact

The partnership with Applied Labs did more than just clean up a workflow. It established Brian, Francois, and Chelsea as the company’s internal AI experts. While other departments were exploring automation, the CX team was the first to deliver a working solution with Applied Labs.

"This is literally the only AI project that came to fruition out of the whole company so far. Now that we're confident with where we're at, people are starting to ask, 'Hey, do you think you could get it set up to help with this?' Everyone comes to us about it now, which is pretty cool."

Chelsea Murawski, CX Operations Manager

When CX leaders deliver measurable outcomes, greater responsibility follows. Chelsea is a prime example. Her recent promotion to CX Operations Manager came after demonstrating she could own AI outcomes and modernize a critical workflow—proving that CX leaders can drive technical innovation, not just manage it.

With the voice agent handling the bulk of daily outbound calls, Nabis is treating this project as a company-wide blueprint, with the CX team's success setting the standard for future AI investments. The Confirmations team is already exploring ways to deepen their partnership with Applied Labs, continuing to unlock the full potential of CX at Nabis.

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Get in touch

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